The week ended aboard the International Space Station with more biomedical checks to keep astronauts fit and healthy on long-term missions in microgravity. The Expedition 73 residents are also preparing to split up in a couple of weeks while keeping up cargo and maintenance duties aboard the orbital outpost.
Heart scans and hearing tests were the main research tasks on Friday with doctors on the ground reviewing the downlinked health data to ensure the crew is safely adapting to living and working in weightlessness.
NASA Flight Engineers Jonny Kim and Anne McClain began their day with human research activities in the Columbus laboratory module. The duo first set up and activated medical gear before Kim collected and recorded McClain’s blood pressure while researchers on the ground monitored in real time. Next, Kim scanned McClain’s chest with the Ultrasound 2 device as ground personnel observed her blood flow to understand the cardiovascular risks of spaceflight.
Station Commander Takuya Onishi of JAXA (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) joined NASA Flight Engineer Nichole Ayers and took turns participating in a computerized hearing test. The astronauts often use the Quest airlock since it is a quiet module, wear headphones, and respond to tones emitted during the test. The station’s multiple life support systems and science hardware operate continuously affecting the orbital outpost’s acoustic environment and audiologist’s are studying its impact on the crew’s hearing.
McClain, Ayers, and Onishi are now turning their attention to the end of their mission and return to Earth targeted for early August. The trio spent the second of half of Friday reviewing SpaceX Dragon departure procedures on computer tablets. They arrived at the station with Roscosmos Flight Engineer Kirill Peskov as NASA’s SpaceX Crew-10 members docking to the Harmony module’s forward port aboard Dragon on March 15.
Before the Crew-10 quartet leaves, NASA’s SpaceX Crew-11 mission is targeted to launch no earlier than July 31 with Commander Zena Cardman of NASA leading Pilot Mike Fincke of NASA and Mission Specialists Kimiya Yui of JAXA and Oleg Platonov of Roscosmos. Once aboard the space station, the Commercial Crew foursome will spend several months studying stem cell production methods to develop advanced cures, new ways to treat bacterial infections, space agriculture techniques, and more.
Peskov joined fellow cosmonaut Alexey Zubritskiy and continued unpacking some of the nearly three tons of food, fuel, and supplies delivered recently aboard the Progress 92 resupply ship after it docked to the Poisk module. Veteran cosmonaut and Flight Engineer Sergey Ryzhikov, on his third spaceflight, ended his week servicing communications and life support gear throughout the space station’s Roscosmos segment.
Learn more about station activities by following the space station blog, @space_station on X, as well as the ISS Facebook and ISS Instagram accounts.
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